On Thursday, March 03, 2011 04:44:58 pm Les Mikesell wrote: > So there are actually apps that work in Linux that aren't available for > OS X? Yep. For one example, there are the LinuxDSP plugins. There are others. > I'm kind of surprised that a local disk controller would be better in > that respect than a network card. Can be, depending upon the controller's chipset. Networking has somewhat non-deterministic characteristics, even for small networks. And, if you don't need networking to get the job done, why have it? And don't believe what the IRQ-steering docs say; sharing IRQ's with audio interfaces in not going to be reliable (been there, done that, got the ALSA xruns to prove it), at least not the last time I tried it. By cutting out devices completely that need IRQ's, you can gain some control over what IRQ goes where, in terms of the physical PCI slot, that leaving interfaces enabled 'Just Because' will complicate. In one specific example, disabling the ethernet interface on the motherboard of one particular machine, along with some of the other devices like the onboard sound card and modem, I was able to get the video card (nVidia) off the IRQ the audio interface's PCI slot (newer motherboard; only one regular PCI slot in a location conducive to the audio interface) had to have....